The leader smiled. Evidently the blood Alan had seen on his chest had been someone else's, for he was unhurt. Now he said to their minds, "The girdles and arm bands are traditional. They go back farther than the oldest histories, and date perhaps from our original home, which was on a different planet from our present one. We consider them attractive, if gaudy and a little unfitted for our sort of civilization; but it would be unthinkable to change our mode of dress after so many centuries." "And _that_ is the attitude I rebelled against," said Mac aloud, from his place between two guards. "That's how they look at everything. Jee-blighted-rusalem, can you blame me?" He stared at his manacled wrists. "I used to go around the cities in a kind of toga that appealed to my esthetic sense. My God, I was shunned. I was a pariah. No armband." The leader smiled again. "My nephew exaggerates. Five hundred years haven't calmed that roiling renegade blood. "I know what you are desirous of knowing. I will try to tell you the story simply and quickly, for I must join my companion ship within two hours in the island which I see you call England." He glanced at Brave and Alan. "First I must thank you for your indispensable help in overcoming the rebels at Project Star." "We didn't do much for you." "You fought beside us when you hated us for the bombing of your cities; that implies understanding, if not forgiveness. We appreciate that. You saved innocent lives; that is the best way to help us. To kill is a terrible thing to us. We do not do it lightly. To kill innocents, even in cases of dire necessity, is trebly terrible." "Your men went at it as if they were born to it," said Brave. "They do not like it, no, but there is a heritage in our blood of fighting that dates back, as do our clothes, to the times before history." "Pious old fraud," said McEldownie, "you love it, but you won't admit it to yourselves. It was we rebels who were the honest ones." The leader ignored him. "I was about to tell you--" Mac said aloud, so that the leader's thought waves were garbled, "I could hate you two for running amok alongside these sniveling so-and-sos. You helped kill scores of my companions. You couldn't have been that sure we were wrong, could you? Damn it, I loved those boys. I lived with them for a dozen of your match-spark lifetimes."